We introduce a system for real-time sperm whale rendezvous at sea using an autonomous uncrewed aerial vehicle. Our system employs model-based reinforcement learning that combines in situ sensor data with an empirical whale dive model to guide navigation decisions. Key challenges include (i) real-time acoustic tracking in the presence of multiple whales, (ii) distributed communication and decision-making for robot deployments, and (iii) on-board signal processing and long-range detection from fish-trackers. We evaluate our system by conducting rendezvous with sperm whales at sea in Dominica, performing hardware experiments on land, and running simulations using whale trajectories interpolated from marine biologists' surface observations.
@article{arxiv.2512.05808,
title = {Real-time Remote Tracking and Autonomous Planning for Whale Rendezvous using Robots},
author = {Sushmita Bhattacharya and Ninad Jadhav and Hammad Izhar and Karen Li and Kevin George and Robert Wood and Stephanie Gil},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.05808},
year = {2025}
}